BELGRADE, Nov 15 (Hina) - Around noon on Thursday, members of a Serbian Interior Ministry special police unit, known as the Red Berets, whose disbanding the Serbian government announced yesterday, again set up barricades on a road
leading to their training centre at Kula, in Vojvodina. Some hundred meters from the entrance to the base, the police blocked the road with two armoured transporters, each guarded by several Red Berets, wearing camouflage uniforms and armed with machine guns. According to unofficial sources, officials from the Serbian Interior Ministry and the Red Berets last night held talks at the Kula training centre but the outcome of the meeting is not known. The Red Berets have so far refused to say if today's conduct is the continuation of their four-day protest and if they will address the public. The Serbian government decided at yesterday's special session that the unit would no longer be under the
BELGRADE, Nov 15 (Hina) - Around noon on Thursday, members of a
Serbian Interior Ministry special police unit, known as the Red
Berets, whose disbanding the Serbian government announced
yesterday, again set up barricades on a road leading to their
training centre at Kula, in Vojvodina.
Some hundred meters from the entrance to the base, the police
blocked the road with two armoured transporters, each guarded by
several Red Berets, wearing camouflage uniforms and armed with
machine guns.
According to unofficial sources, officials from the Serbian
Interior Ministry and the Red Berets last night held talks at the
Kula training centre but the outcome of the meeting is not known.
The Red Berets have so far refused to say if today's conduct is the
continuation of their four-day protest and if they will address the
public.
The Serbian government decided at yesterday's special session that
the unit would no longer be under the jurisdiction of the state
security sector but transferred to the public security sector, thus
practically disbanding the unit. The Serbian Premier said all those
refusing to put themselves under the command of the sector of public
security "can start looking for another job."
The Red Berets rebelled last Friday demanding the resignation of
Interior Minister Dusan Mihajlovic claiming he had duped them into
arresting the Banovic brothers last Thursday.
The police claimed Mihajlovic issued them with a verbal order to
arrest dangerous criminals and that they did not know the persons in
question were Serbs wanted by the international war crimes tribunal
in The Hague. The Red Berets also demanded the adoption of a law on
cooperation between Yugoslavia and the Hague tribunal.
Serbian Premier Zoran Djindjic told them yesterday to "do their
job" and refrain from interfering with political decisions and
legal procedures. The Serbian government yesterday did not accept
the resignation of Minister Mihajlovic but it accepted the
resignations of the head of the secret police, Goran Petrovic, and
his deputy Zoran Mijatovic.
(hina) sb rml